


New Medicine

by violenteer



Category: Outlast (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Robots & Androids, Healing Sex, M/M, guess what? i like android sex AND THATS the tea
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-25
Updated: 2018-02-25
Packaged: 2019-03-23 15:30:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13790652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/violenteer/pseuds/violenteer
Summary: Eddie comes to in an unfamiliar place with unfamiliar pain. He doesn't remember who he is or where he's been. In the middle of his confusion comes a strange man that offers a helping hand. Who is Eddie to refuse?





	New Medicine

Eddie wakes up without much of an idea of who or where he is. His wrists and ankles aren’t bound, which is new. But there’s a metal bar spanning the width of his chest, and when Eddie flexes, it doesn’t budge. He’s trapped, more or less. Eddie’s been trapped before. It’s funny, because he would much rather remember what his name is or what he was doing before he was being held underneath a soft white light inside of a dome-shaped room, but instead all Eddie remembers is that he’s used to having little or no autonomy.

What does that make him? What does it say about his location or his past? If Eddie has been here for longer than however much time he’d been asleep, what’s the cause of his imprisonment? Is he a danger to someone or something? Is he a danger to himself? Eddie racks his brain in an attempt to remind himself whether or not he’s capable of self-harm, but his answer comes to him in the form of curious eyes meeting strange, winding lines that are lighter and darker than the rest of his bared forearms; scars.

How did he get these scars? Some of them – most of them – look old. As if he’s been fighting either his own demons or someone else’s for a long time. Is that the case? Is Eddie a fighter? He racks his brain again, eyes flickering shut, but nothing comes to mind. Just a soul-deep pang of emptiness that pervades his logical thought.

Eddie opens his mouth to speak, then wonders exactly what he should say. Is he alone? Is he being watched? Will someone come in now that he’s awake? Is he… in a hospital? In prison? Eddie can’t be at home. Everything is too pale and impersonal. There are hardly any opinionated pieces in the room; even the chair set beside where he’s stood looks as though it could flicker and fade out of reality without notice.

Maybe it’s better to focus on himself. Eddie’s eyes scan the rest of his body, but most of it is covered in white cloth. He flinches and wonders how long he’s been wearing these clothes. They’re unwrinkled and smell vaguely of detergent, though the scent isn’t floral or earthy. Its quality is more industrial.

There’s more to observe, and Eddie would like to, but just as his eyes begin to touch on the precarious tiling of the floor, a door that he can’t see whooshes open and a set of soft footsteps dance in Eddie’s ears. Someone. A person. Another man, or is it a woman? A doctor? A nurse? A prison guard? Eddie turns his neck, curiosity burning him from the inside out, but he finds himself wrong on all fronts. Or at least he thinks he’s wrong.

The person in his room isn’t a person at all. It looks as though it’s made completely of light and shine, silhouette built to mimic a human’s, surely, but the similarities between one and the other dropping off there. It’s… Eddie can’t say. Some sort of man-made creature. A machine that moves as though it’s walking.

“What is this?” Eddie asks, voice rough as sandpaper.

He coughs on his own dehydration and hangs his head in momentary shame; where’s the sense in being seen or heard if he isn’t presentable?

The machine before him seems to quiver for a few seconds before going strangely still and tilting what would pass for a head, lights designating eye sockets flaring.

“Would you like me to describe your situation?” The machine asks. 

It pauses and… waits. Waits on an answer from Eddie himself. Another oddity. As far as Eddie knows, he’s not normally one to make decisions like this one. Still, he must answer. Eddie needs more information desperately, and this machine is willing to oblige him.

“Yes.” His throat itches with the effort.

Almost amused, the robot says, “You are patient number seventy-three. Your name is Gluskin. You are injured.”

Eddie blinks hard, working to comprehend where that voice is coming from, if it is real at all. Gluskin. Gluskin, Gluskin. Does that sound familiar? Does Eddie know a Gluskin? If it’s his name, it should probably ring some bells, shouldn’t it? But Eddie feels nothing.

“Do you understand?” Eddie starts.

But it’s just the machine again.

“My name is Gluskin,” Eddie says slowly, nodding. “I’m a patient.”

“Number seventy-three.” The machine amends, its head tilting up and back.

“I’m… hurt?” Eddie asks.

The pain comes to him, then. It’s a flicker at first, and then it’s everywhere. Consuming him like poison, spread out from his ribs, a large epicenter ringed by dozens of lines and veins of white heat. Eddie surges forward on instinct, his lungs filling with and emptying air quickly. He’s in shock. Immediate shock, and it’s almost as bad as the feeling of breathing, of moving. Of being alive at all. He hadn’t noticed. Eddie should have noticed this amount of agony.

What’s happened to him? How? When? 

Gasping, Eddie grinds out, “ _Please_ ,” without further explanation.

His hands are balled up in tight fists. Eddie’s body is lined in tension. What he wouldn’t give for this feeling to end. Just to stop. Now, now, now. Forever. The relief of sleep would be so pleasant.

“Do you… pain medication?” He gets out through a shuddering wheeze.

The machine doesn’t speak right away, which only leaves Eddie feeling worse and worse. He tries to curl in on himself to protect what must be a wound just below his chest, but there’s no way he’d be able to break the metal binding holding him to his spot. It doesn’t matter – it doesn’t matter, and Eddie doesn’t care. He just wants the pain to stop. He wants the world to stop, for time to stop, so that he doesn’t have to suffer through each passing moment. 

“Your victim profile is petite blond men with no noticeable facial hair, usually younger than you. Shorter, less extroverted. Softer.” It’s a litany of words Eddie cannot and will not understand.

His victim profile? What the hell does that mean? He wills his eyes open just long enough to look the machine in its pseudo-face.

“Make this stop.” Eddie begs, emotion threatening to warp the words completely.

“You are unable to detail a desired companion at this time. Your attention is limited.” It continues.

Eddie knows his attention is limited. He sweeps numb fingers over his ribs and feels sick, like he might vomit all over himself. Why is he in an upright position? Where did this pain _come from_? 

“Therefore, I will pattern myself after your victim profile. Do you understand?”

He doesn’t understand. Not at all. Eddie wants to shake his head, but it would require too much of that attention the machine mentioned before.

Eddie’s mouth opens and closes. He looks like a fish on land, gaping, struggling for the world as he’s known it to make sense once more. 

“Do you understand?” The voice becomes no more or less insistent, but still Eddie feels as though he’s been reprimanded.

“No.” He croaks, convulsing against his will. “Please, if there’s a doctor, I need,” Eddie’s eyes roll back in his head.

_Help. Help me._

Through his eyelids, Eddie registers an odd flash of light that makes about as much sense as the pain that rocks him out of his mind. There’s sound, too, but his ears are ringing and it’s so small that one covers the next. Eddie hopes the light was some sort of alarm, or perhaps a second party brightening the place up to figure out where Eddie’s been injured. He needs someone to pay attention to this; to the agony that the machine brought him.

It was the machine, wasn’t it? Yes. Yes, it had to be. Or… Eddie doesn’t know. He doesn’t know what to think. How long will he be stuck like this? How long – Eddie’s eyes snap open at the feeling of hands on his bared skin.

“Thank God,” he moans, slumping forward and into the callused warmth he finds.

There’s a slight chuckle and something like rustling fabric, and then a stranger speaks.

“I’m not God, but I am here to help.”

A man stands before him. He’s fair-skinned, blond hair curling at his ears and light brown eyes focused intently on Eddie himself. His neck is exposed, and when Eddie looks down, he realizes this person is wearing… nothing. Nothing at all. Not one stitch of clothing.

At his feet, there’s a pool of cream-colored cloth. 

“Who a-are you?” Eddie forces himself to ask.

The feeling of impossible tightness in his chest eases when the stranger strokes a gentle hand down the front of his shirt.

“That’s funny,” the stranger says, smiling lightly, “no one really asks.”

Eddie moans when the stranger presses his fingers into the line of his side, fingertips trailing up each rib and somehow – somehow – taking Eddie’s pain away,

“Oh, fuck. How? How are you doing that?” It’s an immediate question to which Eddie finds there should be absolutely no answer.

“This is my job.” The blond man answers. “I make people feel better through touch. I was told to stay with you through the week you’ve been here – yeah, it’s been a week, sorry if no one’s told you yet – and heal you when you were finally awake. And you are. Lucky me.”

“It’s your job? You’re a… a doctor?” Eddie guesses.

His voice is airy, and his posture is relaxed. Whoever this person is, his hands are made of magic. Eddie feels almost nothing, now, other than a dull throb that stifles itself when wandering hands come near.

“Not quite.” The stranger says. “I’ll explain.”

But he doesn’t. At least not at first. Eddie waits, and instead of more words, there’s a mouth on his neck and warm breath ghosting out over his skin. Eddie’s about to protest, shout already halfway out of his mouth, when he feels something in his ribcage move. It feels awful for one second, and then everything is fine. 

Almost like one has a correlation with the other.

“My name is Waylon. I’m a doctor of a kind, though I have no physical license and I definitely didn’t go to school for this.” Waylon’s voice is warmed by a smile Eddie feels.

More kisses trail up to his jaw. There’s a hint of teeth, and another mending snap in Eddie’s chest.

“Fuck!” He exclaims, squirming.

“I’m here,” there’s a tongue inside Eddie’s ear, “to heal you. For me to do that, I need to feel you. Touch you. Taste you. Fuck you – even if it’s normally the other way around for someone like you.”

Someone like him? Eddie boils with confusion.

“You have a troubled history, but it’s not at the forefront of your mind. You will enjoy this. Everyone does. It’s my job.” Waylon’s little speech rounds out, and he steps away from his patient. 

There’s so much to process, and Eddie should probably be trying to focus on what’s being asked of him, but all he can think about is how hard he hurt before Waylon came into the room. He doesn’t – Eddie still has no memory of who he is or what he is, even where he is, but if there’s a cure for whatever injury he accumulated in his murky life, Eddie will gladly take it.

Or, he should.

“I don’t understand.” He pushes out.

Pain floods the left side of his body. Eddie reaches without thinking about it for Waylon’s touch. Warm palms settle on his stomach and press delicately forward. The gut-wrenching feeling recedes. 

“You will.”


End file.
